Vision Sunday 2025 - Pastor Tom Loghry
Pastor Tom outlines plans for the fall and challenges the church to live out Colossians 3.
Transcript:
It's hard to believe that summer is just about wrapped up. It goes by too quick, doesn't it? We're gonna be back in the Psalms one more time next Sunday before we move on to a new series. But we step aside from the Psalms today to consider the road ahead. I like to designate this Sunday as Vision Sunday.
It's kind of the Sunday that comes right before we get back into the rush of things, as we get into fall. And I like to take this Sunday as an opportunity to make sure that we can all get our feet headed in the same direction. In Christ, we are made a family, and as a family, it's important that we be committed to Christ and to one another.
That we prioritize being together. And so before turning to God's word and contemplating what our life together should look like, I want to remind you of our discipleship process and what we have in store in the months ahead. So over the past several years, I've gone over this with you. Many of you have been here for these Vision Sundays, and so you'll recall that our purpose, our mission is to know God and to make God known.
And the way that we do that is as disciples. We are disciples who are making disciples. And the way that we go about doing that is kind of captured in what I've described as kind of our discipleship pyramid. In three tiers we've got our worship and community life, small groups, and cruxial studies, and cruxial studies is just kind of a catchall for any teaching opportunities that we have.
But the foundation of discipleship is our worship and community life together and this is an important thing for us to press into. The reality is, is that this is an area that, that our state struggles with. I last, the other week, I, I saw this graphic that was put out, by Ryan Burge. He's kind of a religious sociologist, and I know the numbers are too small for you to see there, but basically compares religious attendance in the United States and Europe, and it compares each state, and you'll find Rhode Island down here at 14% in terms of weekly religious service attendance, now that's all religions, it's not just Christians, but it's all, all religions. It's only 14%. 14% of people in Rhode Island go to a religious service every single week. The only state, that has a lower rate than that is Maine at at 12%. What we see here is a cultural issue. It's not. So when we're looking at our church, it's not just an issue to our church or any particular other church around us.
It's a cultural issue in our, in our state that we're wrestling with in terms of being committed to seeking God, worshiping him on a weekly basis. But when we think about our discipleship process, this is fundamental. You gotta, we, we have to be committed to one another and to worshiping God in order to really build and grow, not just as a church community, but also personally in your own faith, to be able to hear God's word and to be encouraged and challenged by your brothers and sisters and to offer that same encouragement and challenge to others. So that's just a really basic consideration, is just the fundamentals of making sure that we're coming to church on a weekly basis as much as, as we possibly can, and, and so kind of with that in mind, we also can anticipate some things that we're gonna be doing in the fall. So we've got a preaching series that we're going to be getting into in September. We're gonna be going back into the Old Testament. We're going to the Book of Exodus, and we're gonna look at the Israelite's captivity in Egypt, going up through their Exodus, basically up to their crossing of the Red Sea. so I like to try to go back and forth between the New Testament and the Old Testament so we kind of have a sense of the complete picture of what God's doing. And then, when we get, then we'll do probably an advent series around the, the story of Christmas once we get to December.
But on the other side of Christmas, we're gonna get back into the Book of Acts and look at Paul's missionary journeys. And then I'm anticipating that after that we'll look at some of the Paul, we'll look at one of Paul's letters to the churches. We, we also are going to be doing some, some teaching, offering some of our Truth Rooted videos and thinking about also offering a, a seminar potentially in, in November.
I'm not sure if we're gonna bring someone in or if I, if I'll, if, or if I'll do it. I can tell you that the video series that's gonna be coming up in September is gonna be focused on sharing our faith. It's gonna be probably about four parts. And just understanding how you can articulate the gospel to people in a way that's kind of easy to remember, and in an easy way to explain to others.
And I also just want to, and I, I was, I, I knew that was missing. I was like, why isn't that there? I must have put the order in the wrong way. So just wanted to remind you too, that we're gonna continue doing our fellowship things after service. So, having, having the refreshments afterwards, having, having meals, not every month, but many, many of the months.
And we've just really enjoyed the, the sweet opportunities that those gatherings have had for us to deepen our, our relationships with each other. We're gonna keep doing sermon circles after services, so if you're not familiar with sermon circle, after the service we gather together and just have some conversation about what we just heard, kind of digging in more deeply.
And we use the sermon reflection sheets that I usually give out every Sunday. So that's, those sheets are for everyone. I encourage everyone to take them just to kind of deepen your own, your understanding and reflection, but it's something we also use in Sermon Circle and so we're gonna be doing that as I said, the truth rooted videos, and something that sometimes gets forgotten is our church has this video resource called RightNow Media that provides, it's kind of like, we call the Netflix of, of Bible study material. They've got video studies for adults, they also have lots of content for kids.
So many of you may have already been signed up for that. You can access it on your computer, you can access it via your smartphone. Or if you have a smart tv, you could have, they have an app, right, for your smart tv. So you can sign up for that, you can ask me to send you an invitation link or you can use the QR code.
And if you know anyone that you might think might benefit from these resources, you can share it with them, and we have our church card in the back and it's got a little QR code, please give that to people and just say, Hey, here's this free resource that we have. Please use it. so that, that's some of the teaching content, the teaching and preaching content that you can expect over the next few months.
Something also just to kind of keep in mind is I, I'm gonna be away a little bit in the next month. I'm gonna be going to Liberia from September 26th to October 7th to put on a training conference for pastors there. Very excited for that trip. Making, making preparations for it, hoping to acquire some Bible study materials for those pastors because they don't have full libraries like we get to enjoy over here in the US. And I actually, just the other day, one of the pastors from Liberia, they must have been telling them about us, friend requested me on Facebook. So we kind of just chatted a little bit. So very much looking forward to that trip, but I'll be away for about 10 days.
And while I'm away, the first Sunday, the Eastern Regional superintendent, Tim Soucy is going to be coming here to preach. So this will be the first time that he's come to our church, he just came into this role in the past year. So looking forward to him having the opportunity to meet with you and share God's word with you.
And then the week after there's going to be a visit from the women from Teen Challenge. So we have some things to look forward to in, in the next month ahead. And as, as you recall from that discipleship pyramid, we've got our weekly fellowship and worship and then small groups, and small groups is kind of that way for you to take the next step in being intentional and growing in your faith and also being intentional about growing closer in your relationship with others in the church.
And so we're very much continuing with what we've done in the past couple of years. Small groups meet twice a month, so in total this fall, they'll meet six times. we've got women's small groups starting, they'll start up the week of September 7th. we've got our Monday morning group led by Jodie that meets at 10:00 AM and Becky is going to be leading a small group.
We're very excited about her taking over this, this small group to lead it. And that'll be on Monday evenings at 7:00 PM, and that'll be via Zoom. We, we found that sometimes it's challenging for the women that aren't able to go to the morning group 'cause they're working during the day that sometimes it's tough to get out when you have a family to feed and just all those things.
So instead they're gonna be meeting virtually and potentially having some in person kind of gathering at the end of the season. But they'll be meeting via Zoom. And we've got some men's small groups. we have a group that meet, we'll meet on Tuesday at six, Friday at 9:30 AM. And for those groups, guys, if you have any feedback, if they need to be tweaked by like a half hour or so, please, please let me know.
we just kind of have to take a stab out there in terms of what we're planning to do, and then we can make adjustments along the way. But on the whole, I, I encourage everyone to please try to get involved with these groups. the wonderful thing about them is each month is a different topic. So it's not as though if you miss one meeting, like, oh, it's, all is lost, you're gonna be way behind everybody. We do a different topic each month of the different discipleship attributes. And so this is just something we want to really encourage you to do, to grow deep, again, to grow deeper in your own faith and to help others grow deeper in their faith. so the way that you can get signed up for them, we've got signups in the back, and then during our cookout we're gonna have sign ups at each of the tables and we'll eventually kind of collect all those and we'll figure out how many people we have in each group. Also, I wanna remind you of the prayer opportunities that we have in the church. We have a time of prayer before the service every Sunday that meets in the church study over there. Every month we have stay to pray, usually that's at the end of the month in place of sermon circle, and we just gather up in small groups and there's a few things that we've identified for common points of prayer, but it's also an opportunity for you to share any, any items that you might have for prayer and the group will pray for those things. But I also wanna encourage us to be thinking about more opportunities and, it's something that's been on my mind and I'm, that I'm thinking through and I was so encouraged because Denise Rodriguez reached out to me earlier this week about a prayer gathering to be hosted at at her home.
And that's gonna be September 15th, is it? September 15th at 6:00 PM. At the end of the day, we could make all sorts of plans and things like that, but what we really need is the Holy Spirit to be at work in our midst. We need God's intervention, not only in our church, but in our town, in this area, you know, going back to that stat 14%.
And that's, that's only telling part of the story of some of the, the spiritual battle going on in Rhode Island, and the way that we take on that battle is in prayer. And so that's something that we're gonna be thinking through, how we'll prioritize that and create more opportunities for that. So these things are important, but it is no less important that we consider who we will be in the season ahead. And I began thinking about this because earlier this week, on Monday, I had a, a phone conversation with Tim Soucy, our regional superintendent. He was just checking in on me, seeing how I was doing, and kind of in the course of our conversation, I confessed that I'm expecting that with some of the travel that I have ahead of me, that I'll be feeling in some ways, maybe that I'm not doing enough here at the, at the local level, that I'll, I'll struggle with that, that maybe there's some more things that I should be doing.
And when, when I shared that with him, he, he challenged me, he challenged me to contemplate something else instead. He challenged me to meditate on who I was going to be rather than being focused on all the things that I was gonna try to do. And I'd like to make the same challenge to you, which takes us to Colossians three verses 12 through 17, and I, I'll read that passage again.
Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
This passage begins with Paul saying that we are God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved. What does that mean? What does it mean to be God's chosen, holy and dearly loved? Well, from the rest of scripture, we understand that it means that we are those who have been chosen in Christ, that we've put our trust in Christ, that we've been covered by the righteousness of Christ, that we've been redeemed by Christ.
The fact that we're God's chosen people has nothing to do with our class or race or anything like that, or, and it's not based on our, our performance. It's based only and completely upon the fact that we have been united with Christ by faith.
So that's one part of what it means to be God's chosen, holy and dearly loved. Now, the signs of that identity, that we are God's chosen people, should be manifest by the qualities that Paul lists here. He says, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. That's what we should be known as, as those who are in Christ, as God's chosen people. As a church, we should be known as people that are compassionate, kind, humble, gentle, and patient. You notice how all those things have to do with basically living with other people. You know, sometimes we, I, I've thought about, you know, you, you see these guys that are monks.
And there's some, some guys that have been hermits, and they've gone out in the wilderness and, to pursue a life of holiness, focusing solely and completely on the Lord. And while it can be good to get away, Jesus got away for a little while too at times from his disciples and the crowds, the virtues that God is calling for us to live out can only be done in community. You can only be compassionate if there's only, if there's those that you can show compassion to. You need others to be kind to. Even humility, I would say, we have to be humble before others. So these are the things that we, as members of Rockland Community Church, should be known for.
We should clothe ourselves with these qualities. Paul also says that we should bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. Now, this is something that I think is most challenging to any church community, to truly bear with each other and forgive each other as God has forgiven you.
Instead, what I think we often see in the church is this is, there's a tendency among Christians that when they have conflict with another Christian in their church, rather than going to them and saying, Hey, like, that really hurt me, and working out the conflict and showing grace and forgiveness to each other, instead, Christians tend to either blow up and so then there's a big conflict. Or we just kind of ghost. We just kind of disappear. And I think that latter reaction is what we see happening a lot in the church these days, is people just kind of disappear. Something happens in the church, kind of they're rubbed, someone's rubbed the wrong way, and then they just kind of slowly kind of disappear from church. And the problem, and if there was a real problem to be addressed, the problem never goes addressed. And, and what's most grievous, I think, based on what Paul is saying here, is we miss this opportunity to actually live out the gospel, to forgive others as we ourselves have been forgiven. The church of Jesus Christ and our church here should be known as a place where grace can be found, where we actually live out the gospel by bearing with one another and our weaknesses and all our flaws, and showing forgiveness to each other. Now, the, the only way that any of this can happen, really, is if we truly love one another.
Paul says in verse 14, he says, and over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. This makes clear sense. You can't show compassion unless you love others. You can't show kindness, humility, even again, humility, if you don't have a greater love for other people and for God, you're gonna be egotistical.
You'll be consumed with yourself, you'll be prideful. It's, it is love that holds all these things together. It's, it's love that that enables us to show gentleness and patience towards others who are really getting on our nerves. And this is a love that does not come from ourselves. This is a love which comes from God.
We love God because he first loved us, and we love others because of the love that we have received from God.
Paul also says that the community of the church should be defined by peace. He says, let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. Now, if you can imagine that if all these virtues are in place, if we are compassionate, kind, gentle, patient, humble, forgiving, one another, loving one another, then peace will abound in the church.
You can't have peace, though, unless you have those qualities being manifested, and those qualities are brought forth in our lives by our union with Christ. Jesus says in John 15, apart from me, you can do nothing. It's only if we're joined to Christ that we bear forth this fruit in our life. This is the fruit of the Holy Spirit, and when we begin bearing out that fruit, it begins transforming the community.
So when people come into our church, especially when they're joining our church, they should know this church to be a place of peace. That doesn't mean that you never deal with conflict or you never have to work through things. But it's a place where we maintain the peace of Jesus Christ. And then he has a, he just tags on this little bit here in verse 15, he says, and be thankful.
Be thankful.
I think we underappreciate how important it is to practice Thanksgiving. We can get so caught up in the things that we don't have, and this can apply both personally in your own personal life, you can think about the things that you don't have. We can also, corporately as a church, we can think about the things maybe we don't have and wish we had, or the things that aren't happening that we wish were happening and we fail to give God thanks for the things that he's given us, that we fail to give God thanks for the things that he is doing, and I can, I think it could also be said that this attitude of thankfulness, this practice of Thanksgiving should also be extended, not just in our response to God, but to each other being thankful for one another.
Now when we get to verse 16, you could say that all of this is really kind of explaining to us what Paul here says when he tells the Colossians let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through Psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your heart.
Obviously the, the message of Christ does not dwell richly among us if we're not actually living it out. But the message of Christ also only dwells in our midst in all its richness, when it's actually articulated clearly as we teach one another, as we admonish one another.
That is something that our church should also be known for, that we stand on the truth of the Bible, that we remain faithful to God's word, even when it's, even when it's difficult, and that we apply the word, not just in the context of the Sunday morning service, but on every occasion. It is not only my task as pastor to teach and admonish you in accordance with God's word, others of you have been called to teach and I would say all of us have been called to admonish one another in accordance with God's word. This is what it means to be the body of Christ. This is what it means for us to build each other up. And something else that Paul notes here is that we have to do this in wisdom.
So that doesn't mean that we, we just kind of go around like with a Bible cannon blasting people. We don't do that. We do it in all wisdom and with all the virtues that he's just talked about here. Compassion, kindness, humility, gentle, gentleness, patience. And what's really interesting here too, is how Paul says that the songs that we sing play a role in this as well, Psalms, hymns, songs from the Spirit. These have a role of teaching and admonishing us, and it's for that reason I try to be careful in the songs that we select for our worship to try and make them, select songs that will align with the teaching of God's word. Because this is an opportunity for us to learn, even as we sing.
It's an opportunity for us to admonish one another as we're all singing these words together.
And we get to verse 17, and verse 17 really gets to answering this question that we might ask, which is, why do we do what we do? Why do we do all these things?
Paul says, in whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
This kind of takes us back to that virtue He identifies at the beginning, humility. You see, it's not about us. We're not doing any of these things. The life of this church here is not about any one of us, and I, it's not even about us collectively, even while our collective life is, is important.
What it's really about is bringing glory to Jesus Christ, so that whatever we're doing in word or deed, we're all doing it in the name of Jesus Christ that he would be glorified, that each one of us would be directed towards him, and that those who don't know him yet would be directed toward him.
That everything that we're doing is in fact an expression of our thanks to God for all that he has done for us, not out of guilt or something like that, that's not the sort of attitude to have, but it it's a, it's a glad response to God and it's a response that, yes, again, flows from our union with Christ.
So what God's word tells us here is the true substance of the vision I, I felt called to share with you. There's so many things we could do. Really good things. We need much wisdom in discerning what we should do and what we should not do. But at the end of the day, whatever our plans may be, what really matters is the sort of people that we're going to be.
Will we be the people of Christ or will we be something else? Our fellowship, our worship, our teaching, our groups should all be occasions in which it can be said the message of Christ is dwelling among us richly. So that when those who are just beginning to seek Jesus and those who already believe encounter us, they can say that they've encountered the spirit of Christ in our midst, his compassion, his kindness, his humility, his gentleness, and and patience, his forgiveness, his teaching and admonition.
There is no substitute for truly following Jesus, for walking in his ways. No program, no strategy, no method can replace that substance, the presence of Christ in us. If we seek him with our whole hearts, I believe that we will see others seek him as they see his life in our community, manifest both here where we gather and out there as as we go.
This is our call and it is enough for us. Let us pray.
Father, we thank you.
We thank you for this church.
By this church father, yes, we give you thanks for this building, but what we really mean Father, is thank you for this church, this, this branch of the body of Christ. Thank you for this church. Father, thank you for the grace that you've shown us in Jesus Christ and that, and what you've ministered to us through this body.
Father, we pray that we would manifest all the virtues that Paul talks about here in Colossians, that the message of Christ would truly dwell among us richly, and that Father, we would be committed to you and to one another. Father, guiding us in your wisdom, lead us to get involved in the ways that we should in the life of this church.
You know the way that each one of us should take. Father, please guide us in that. And Father, help us to commit ourselves to be devoted to worshiping you, not just occasionally father, but regularly. That we would not forsake this gathering. Make it our desire, father, to glorify you to do all things in the name of Jesus Christ, so that you may be praised and so that others may be reconciled to you and be counted among God's chosen people.
We ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Amen.
Hey there, Pastor Tom here. I hope you enjoyed this sermon I offered to Rockland Community Church. Rockland Community Church is located at 212 Rockland Road in North Scituate, Rhode Island, just around the bend from the Scituate Public High School. We invite you to join us in person or virtually this Sunday as we continue our series Summer in the Psalms. It's our joy to welcome you into our community
Intro/Outro Song
Title: River Meditation
Artist: Jason Shaw
Source:http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Jason_Shaw/Audionautix_Acoustic/RIVER_MEDITATION___________2-58
License:(CC BY 3.0 US)